What if enabling the Gates has unforeseen consequences?
Finishing the main quest line triggers either a counter (e.g. 1 year) or gate usage threshold (e.g. 20 gate jumps). After that the [REDACTED] or a new fraction becomes active. They first raid core systems and later start saturation bombing them one by one. They start with fringe worlds and "eat" their way into the core worlds. They always come in swarms similar to the pirates, but it's multiple Ordos.
The player can try to tackle them alone or follow quest lines to rally the different forces in the core worlds into an alliance where they decide to make a stance.
Here is a rough timeline.
- Player finishes the main quest line and gets some time to explore and bolster their forces.
- 1 year later one of the existing Nexuses becomes a Super Nexus (maybe beefier defenses with Dorito support?)
- The Super Nexus sends out 2-3 Ordo scouting parties into the core worlds.
- This event allows to trigger a bar mission to investigate this strange behavior.
- Player gets send around to gather information from TT execs and fight remnants to get pieces of the backstory.
- If the player doesn't get the bar mission, a random Ordo spawns next to them and one of the the officers suggests to investigate after the fight.
- The player can try to destroy the Super Nexus on their own or proceed with the story line.
- The story line allows to pull each fraction into the alliance. Each branch of the story line is different. For example the luddic church wants you to save a planet from raids, while TT asks for a lot of money (e.g. 10 million) or the Ziggurat. Other faction have equally unique stories and should take a considerable amount of time during which the Super Nexus harasses the player and the core worlds.
- Each new faction in the alliance makes the final fights easier
- An optional quest allows the player to start the research of a Nexus Siege Ship, a new kind of ship that absorbs a lot of the damage of the Super Nexus and allows your other ships to be more effective. Maybe the new Siege ship can use the planet breaker?!
- 2 years after the Super Nexus starts sending out scout parties, the nexus sends invasion fleets that completely destroy civilizations in the star systems they invade. After the first invasion things begin escalating. First every 3 months new star sectors get invaded, later every month...
- Either alone or with allied forces the player destroys the Super Nexus and is crowned new High Arch Imperator of the Core Alliance.
- The End
The reason why the AI became active is that there was some kind of contract, that they protect the gates and reactivating the gates leads to annihilation.
This scenario is epic and allows for different levels of difficulty by doing more quests. Experienced players can try to finish the Super Nexus on their own, while new players can do more missions and become more powerful.
Becoming Arch Imperator comes with new duties. The player is required to do regular AI inspections and limit their AI usage to prevent a new Super Nexus from spawning (which would not receive support from the "alliance").
